Final Word from Monday, September 17, 2007
Václav Klaus is running almost the perfect reelection campaign, which makes his attack last week against the Constitutional Court all that much more curious. It was a rare recent display of the "cranky old man" syndrome ascribed to him by David Rath. If this were the U.S., moveon.org would rush out ads declaring that Klaus should be censured for refusing to respect the sole authority of the Constitutional Court to interpret the Constitution. Instead, only Martin Bursík won any significant political points with another of his "if I were president" comments. The Court's decision related to the "unconstitutional" appointment of Jaroslav Bureš as deputy chief justice of the Supreme Court, but it isn't necessarily the big victory that Klaus's critics would portray it as. There's still one more round, and a decision in Klaus's favor around election time would be just what the doctor ordered for curing crankiness.[Czech Republic ČSSD United States advertisements]